This invention relates to toy dolls and more particularly, to a method of making miniature doll heads.
There have been a myriad of toy dolls developed over the years for use by children. One of the most attractive portions of these toy dolls is the doll's head.
The head of a doll is usually constructed by hollow molding a suitable plastic material into the desired shape of the head. The facial expression of the doll is formed by painting the facial features such as the eyes, the mouth, and the cheeks to produce the desired expression. The doll head is completed by attaching doll hair to the scalp; the hair is then groomed to form the desired hair style.
To be successful in the marketplace, a toy doll must be inexpensive to purchase. One way to reduce the cost of producing a doll is to use rapid mass production techniques in its construction. With regard to the doll head, high speed molding techniques are generally used to form the shape of the head. Painting of the facial features is usually accomplished by placing the doll face behind a mask having openings therein and by spray painting the features through the mask. The mask openings form the desired shape of each painted area and act to properly locate each area with respect to the doll face.
Attachment of the doll hair is usually accomplished by sewing (or rooting) strands of hair to the scalp using a rooting machine. The head is mounted to the rooting machine by inserting a spindle portion of the machine into the hollow interior of the head through a neck opening provided therein. The strands are then looped through the scalp surface using holes formed in rows by the rooting machine. Each strand is then cut to a length calculated to produce hair of the desired length for the completed doll head. The length of the hair is in turn made proportional to the size of the doll head. The spacing between adjacent holes and adjacent rows is also made proportional to the size of the doll head.
In recent years, miniature toy dolls have been produced which have become very popular among young children. Producing such a miniature doll of course requires the production of a miniature doll head. It has been found, however, that prior art methods of mass producing doll heads are not suitable for mass producing miniature doll heads. This is particularly true when the height of the doll head, measured from the bottom of the chin to the crown, is less than about one-half inch.
The unsuitability of prior art methods in the mass production of miniature doll heads is due to several factors. For example, it has been found that the facial features of such doll heads are so small and are so close together that the prior art spray painting techniques are not suitable for forming clearly defined patterns of paint. Therefore, the facial expression of a miniature doll face painted using such prior art methods is often blurred and difficult to distinguish. Accordingly, miniature doll faces are in many instances hand painted using a fine artist brush to produce the desired detail. This method is obviously unsuitable for mass producing doll heads.
It has also been found that the small size of a miniature doll head generally precludes the use of prior art hair rooting methods to attach strands of doll hair to such miniature heads. This is so because the neck opening provided in a miniature head is generally too small to permit the insertion of the rooting spindle. Further, there is insufficient room within the hollow doll head to provide the maneuverability required to root the hair in the desired pattern of closely spaced holes and rows. Accordingly, in many instances hair is attached to a miniature doll head by first attaching the hair to a thin cap. The cap is then adhesively attached to the scalp. This method is time consuming and hence increases the cost of producing miniature doll heads.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a new method of making miniature doll heads.
It is another object of this invention to produce a miniature doll head using mass production techniques to form the facial expression.
It is yet another object of this invention to produce a miniature doll head using mass production techniques to attach the doll hair.